Hutchison resignation rumor

U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, according to several reliable sources, has been telling Republicans in the past week that her current plan is to send Gov. Rick Perry a letter next month announcing her intention to resign from office effective on either Dec. 31 or Jan. 1.

By doing that, Hutchison remains in the Senate through this fall’s health care debate while also giving Republicans who want to run for other offices when the dominos fall a chance to shuffle their campaigns. The two most obvious instances are Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, who likely wants to run for Hutchison’s Senate seat, and Attorney General Greg Abbott who wants to run for lieutenant governor.

The filing deadline is Jan. 4, 2010.

The move also would put the ball in Perry’s court for naming an interim senator and then calling a special election to fill Hutchison’s term through 2012.

Hutchison campaign manager Terry Sullivan dismissed the intelligence as nothing more than the latest rumor: “She is not telling anyone that she will send Rick Perry a letter.”

Hutchison this summer said she will resign in October or November to challenge Perry in the GOP primary. She said she wanted to continue to serve Texas during the national health care debate and the debate on cap and trade energy legislation. However, she previously had said she would resign by the end of the year.

One of my sources warned me to keep in mind that Hutchison has given supporters different target zones for her resignation in the past, so this one might be fluid as well.

If she resigned at the end of the year, she would force Perry to make the interim appointment before Jan. 4 if he wanted to give the position to someone such as Dewhurst who has to make a choice about running for re-election. It also might push him to allow the Senate special election to occur on the uniform election date in May so that race won’t interfere with the governor’s race.

Perry can declare an emergency and hold the election sooner, but state law forbids him from setting the special election on the same day as the primary.

There is a high likelihood either way that the Senate race and governor’s race would overlap. The potential exists for a gubernatorial primary in March, with a runoff in April, followed by the Senate special in May with a runoff in June. Four major elections in four months.